This application requests funds to aid in obtaining the necessary additional preclinical data needed for commercialization of a promising new and novel drug candidate for the treatment of multiple myeloma. A small business, Modulation Therapeutics Incorporated, has licensed this technology from the Moffitt Cancer Center and its employee, Dr. Priyesh Jain, in collaboration with Dr. Mark McLaughlin and Dr. Lori Hazlehurst at Moffitt Cancer Center and aided by co-investigator Richard Lush, PharmD, are proposing to synthesize analogs expected to have better bioavailability and that improve or maintain direct binding affinities for CD44 and in vitro IC50 activity. We will measure preliminary PK studies, and confirmatory in vitro and in vivo 5TGM1 MM tumor growth inhibition studies in Phase 1 of the grant. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: This application requests funds to aid a new small business, Modulation Therapeutics Incorporated, in obtaining the necessary additional pre-clinical data needed for commercialization of a promising new and novel drug candidate for the treatment of multiple myeloma. The new drug candidate kills human multiple myeloma tumors, the second most common hematological malignancy in humans, in immune-compromised mice implanted with the human tumor at does that show no obvious toxicity to the mice.